斷電、禁交易所，中國接連出招但比特幣似乎影響不大
儘管面臨中國政府多方圍剿，比特幣一度面臨重擊，但經過一個月，一切似乎和中國政府的盤算不盡相同。
為了讓中國數位人民幣業務順利開展，中國政府有計畫的一步步進攻比特幣，在多處政府連手斷電礦場後，比特幣全網算力腰斬，幣值也連續崩跌，許多人甚至就像中國政府期望的那樣，認為比特幣終究要走向泡沫化。
然而比特幣精巧的設計，反而讓中國政府無所施力。當比特幣價值增長，越來越多人覺得有利可圖而投入挖礦以獲取比特幣時，比特幣網路的挖礦難度也會隨之提升，迫使礦工必須要付出更多資源挖礦，這樣的機制有助於比特幣網路保持平衡。
相反地，當全網算力大幅下降，礦工大量退出時，比特幣的挖礦難度也會隨之下降，誘使更多人投入挖礦。在中國政府於 2021 年六月大舉斷電礦場後，比特幣全網算力腰斬，隨之而來的是難度迅速下降。
原先貢獻全網算力近 60% 的中國礦工退出後，比特幣挖礦難度在一週內下降了約 30%，簡單來說，雖然比特幣幣值因此下跌了 40%，但礦工要獲取比特幣所需付出的資源也下降了 30%。一來一往之間，中國政府斷電礦場的政策，反而是將原本由中國礦工壟斷的挖礦事業，拱手讓給海外礦工，而且消耗的電力還更少。
▲ 比特幣算力從谷底又慢慢回升。（ Source：Bitinfochart）
2021 年 5 月，比特幣全網算力來到歷史高峰 186MTH/s（每秒百萬雜湊值），在中國政府介入後，算力驟降至兩年來最低的 68MTH/s，然而經歷一個月，全球礦工們積極搶下中國讓出的機會，順勢搶購中國礦工便宜出售的礦機，目前算力已回升到 110MTH/s。
除了礦工，雖然中國政府明文禁止交易所，但中國用戶並未消失市場，幣安（Binance）與火幣（Huobi）依然提供中國用戶交易管道，想阻止這些去中心化交易所，光靠中國網路長城還不夠，恐怕還需要金融長城，禁止中國人民將人民幣兌換成他國法幣，才有可能禁絕交易所生存空間。
中國政府打壓無效，最有力的證據就是在過去一個月，這些與中國高度相關的亞洲交易所，包括幣安、火幣與 OKEx，依然是全球最活絡的加密貨幣交易所。相比之下，今年風光上市的美國交易所 Coinbase 交易量，都遠遠落後於這些中國政府認為不合法的交易所。
不可否認，中國政府對於挖礦和交易所的禁令，都對比特幣造成一定程度的衝擊，但短短不到兩個月，比特幣算力與幣值明顯恢復良好，超出許多人預期。過去兩週比特幣上漲超過 40%，幣值從跌破 3 萬美元到超過 4 萬美元，如今落在 38,994 美元，應該讓前陣子接手中國礦機的礦工樂不可支。
（首圖來源：Pixabay）
Market Wrap: Bitcoin Buyers Could Take Profits as Volume Declines
Cryptocurrencies were mostly lower on Tuesday as declining volume suggests a pullback is near. Bitcoin was trading around $45,418 at press time and is down about 1.6% over the past 24 hours.
Some analysts are optimistic about the long-term recovery in crypto prices, although the pace of the upside will likely slow over the short term.
“While many of the technical and on-chain indicators confirm this rebound’s strength, it may still be early to say we are out of the woods,” Nathan Cox, chief investment officer at digital asset management firm TwoPrime, wrote Tuesday in an email to investors.
Latest prices
Related: Bitcoin Price Rebounds After Testing Lower Supports Near $44K As Ether Booms
Cryptocurrencies:
Traditional markets:
S&P 500: 4448, -0.7%
Gold: $1,785.01, -0.08%
10-year Treasury yield closed at 1.263%, down from 1.268% on Monday.
Traders are also monitoring the ongoing regulatory crackdown in several nations, which could damp bullish sentiment.
On Tuesday, the Shenzhen branch of the People’s Bank of China plans to “promptly clean up and rectify” 11 companies for providing illicit crypto trading activities, state-owned Shanghai Securities Journal reported.
Related: White Hats Just Defused a Potential $350M Heist on SushiSwap
In Spain, the National Securities Market Commission issued a warning notice for 12 companies, including crypto exchanges Huobi and Bybit, for providing investment services without being registered with authorities, CoinDesk’s Eliza Gkritsi reported.
And in South Korea, a crypto exchange subsidiary of Japanese tech giant LINE, is reportedly limiting its services next month, according to a report by Yonhap News.
For now, technical charts suggest bitcoin remains in breakout mode with support around $42,000. The loss of short-term momentum could trigger a brief period of profit taking.
Story continues
Bitcoin mining revenue rise
Miners are experiencing greater revenue as the Bitcoin blockchain’s hashrate recovers from July lows. This is a positive sign for the blockchain network and could point to further bitcoin accumulation by miners.
“Over the course of the last two months, hashrate has increased by around 25% from the lows, suggesting hashrate equivalent to around 12.5% of the affected miners have come back online,” Glassnode analysts wrote in a blog post.
The hashrate refers to the total combined computational power that is being used to mine and process transactions.
“In response, the Hash-Ribbons, which attempt to model where stress enters the mining market, have commenced another positive cross-over,” Glassnode wrote. “The Hash-Ribbons are formed by taking the 30-day and 60-day moving average of hashrate with the following signals,” as shown in the chart below.
Decreasing volume
Bitcoin’s trading volume on leading spot exchanges declined over the past week as the short-squeeze rally stalls.
“After the seven-day average real BTC trading volume pushed towards $7 billion last week, we’re now back to $5 billion,” Arcane Research wrote in a Tuesday report.
If bitcoin continues to trade higher on declining volume, “it can signify an exhausted market, and it will probably not be a sustainable move,” Arcane wrote. “We want to see a clear uptick in volume if the BTC price jumps up towards $50K again.”
Latest on Poly Network hack
The Poly Network cyberattack saga has dragged into its second week with the hacker or hackers yet to provide the key for the multi-signature wallet needed to complete the full return of the roughly $600 million that was stolen, with the exception of the $33 million worth of the stablecoin USDT that was frozen by Tether, reports CoinDesk’s Nelson Wang.
China-based Poly Network had previously offered $500,000 to the attacker or attackers as a reward for returning the money taken on the Binance Smart Chain (BSC), Ethereum and Polygon platforms in what is likely the largest-ever hack of a decentralized finance (DeFi) site.
In a message posted to the Ethereum blockchain at 1:45 p.m. UTC on Monday, the attacker, who the Poly Network is calling “Mr. White Hat” but who some others doubt is a true white-hat hacker, said that they were considering taking the bounty and using it to reward anyone else who can hack the cross-chain platform. A “white hat” attacker is one who tries to exploit vulnerabilities in a protocol to help expose and ultimately fix bugs or loopholes in the underlying code.
”MONEY MEANS LITTLE TO ME, SOME PEOPLE ARE PAID TO HACK, I WOULD RATHER PAY FOR THE FUN,” the attacker or attackers wrote.
Altcoin roundup
AUDIO Market Cap Surges Past $1B: Prices for AUDIO, the governance token of decentralized music streaming protocol Audius, nearly doubled in the past 24 hours, pushing its market capitalization above $1 billion for the first time. The price surge comes after Audius announced its partnership with popular video-sharing app TikTok. Data from TradingView and FTX shows that AUDIO’s price started pumping around 16:00 UTC on Aug. 16 and reached a high at $4.04 at approximately 6:00 UTC on Aug. 17. News of the TikTok tie-up first emerged at 15:00 UTC on Aug. 16.
Dfinity’s ICP Rebounds: The blockchain company Dfinity made headlines in May when its internet computer (ICP) tokens were officially released for public trading at a price of $630, giving the project a $45 billion market capitalization. The enthusiasm quickly evaporated as the token plunged 95% over the following month to as low as $27. Since then, the token’s price has doubled to more than $60, according to data from Messari, signaling renewed appetite from investors. Some traders are feeling fresh enthusiasm for the token thanks to a recent increase in developer activity taking place on the network. That’s despite lingering ill will among some investors and developers, including dissidents who have formed a splinter group as well as plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit filed in a U.S. federal court.
1inch Network Launches on Ethereum Optimism: 1inch Network, a platform that aims to find the best deals across multiple decentralized exchanges (DEXs), has expanded to the Optimistic Ethereum mainnet. The move to the layer 2 network makes 1inch Network the second decentralized finance (DeFi) app on Optimistic Ethereum, with the first being Uniswap, 1inch spokesperson Sergey Maslennikov told CoinDesk.
Relevant news:
Other markets
Notable winners of 21:00 UTC (4:00 p.m. ET):
the graph (GRT) +4.69%
Notable losers:
eos (EOS) -6.86%
stellar (XLM) -6.56%
ethereum classic (ETC) -6.12%
Related Stories
Why bitcoin entrepreneurs are flocking to rural Texas
In the middle of rural Texas, a cryptocurrency mine is currently under construction.
Hundreds of machines more powerful than the average computer will soon be housed in this 320-acre mining facility in Dickens county, where they will work day and night to solve a complex series of algorithms. If successful, the reward will be newly minted bitcoin, currently worth about $44,000 each.
All the machines need to thrive are spaces to sit and electricity – lots of it.
Kevin Brendle, Dickens county’s top elected official, embraced the idea of the mine when Argo Blockchain, a Canadian cryptocurrency mining company, first approached him with the idea of building a facility in the area. Dickens county, population 2,300, “is mostly improved pasture and grassland”, Brendle said.
“It’s wide-open range land, it’s cattle country with a little farming,” he said. “We don’t have a lot of economic development.”
A mine could help stimulate the economy, creating jobs and improving the county’s tax base. And in return, the mine will be powered by some of the cheapest electricity in the world.
To be profitable, mining cryptocurrency requires lots of cheap energy. China was once the main hub for mining, with over half of the world’s mining taking place in the country, precisely because its electricity is cheap. But earlier this summer, local governments in China began to shut down bitcoin mines as the country works to develop its own, better-controlled digital currency. The bitcoin hashrate – the processing power used to produce bitcoin – halved after the crackdown.
Miners have since been scouring the globe for places where electricity is cheap, and many have settled on Texas as their destination.
Texas’s power grid is deregulated, which means customers can choose between different power providers and providers are thus incentivized to provide low rates.
Mining facilities can set up long-term contracts with power providers that allows them to purchase electricity at a fixed price for many years, says Jason Les, CEO of Riot Blockchain, a US-based cryptocurrency mining company.
Riot Blockchain recently acquired Whinstone US, the largest bitcoin mining facility in the US based in Rockdale, Texas, for $80m. Whinstone says its facility can produce 500 bitcoin per month – worth a total of $22m at bitcoin’s current value.
When demand for electricity goes up, particularly in the summer months, Texas power companies will actually pay mining facilities to lower their energy usage.
“If you were a miner that has a long-term power purchase agreement, then you own power at a fixed price … you’re committing to buying energy for years no matter what,” Les said.
“As a bitcoin miner, you essentially own that power, and that allows you to work like a virtual power plant. You can take the power that you agreed to buy at a fixed lower price, and then you can sell that back to the grid.”
In recent months, Texas leaders have been vocal about their support of cryptocurrency mining coming to their state.
In June, Governor Greg Abbott signed into law a bill that puts cryptocurrency under commercial law, making it easier for cryptocurrency businesses to operate in the state. In the same month, Abbott, tweeted: “Texas will be the cryptocurrency leader!” after the Texas grocery chain H-E-B announced that it will be putting cryptocurrency kiosks in some of its stores.
Also making the state attractive to miners is that 20% of its energy comes from wind power, making mining in Texas a much greener alternative than mining in China, where about two-thirds of electricity comes from coal. Tesla’s CEO, Elon Musk, halted his company’s acceptance of bitcoin transactions, citing the “rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels for bitcoin mining and transactions, especially coal, which has the worst emissions of any fuel”. Musk said that Tesla will resume accepting bitcoin once there’s confirmation that about half of the energy used by miners will be from clean energy.
While states like Kentucky and Louisiana also have cheap power, and others like Wyoming – which recently made it easier for cryptocurrency businesses to become LLCs – have politicians that are cryptocurrency-friendly, Texas is the only state that seems to offer miners the best of both worlds.
“We’ve seen a good combination of political will with the reality of the electricity market there that have led people to start building in Texas,” said Josh Goodbody, chief operating office of Qredo, a digital asset management company. “Increasingly, people are looking at Texas as a friendly place to build crypto businesses.”
Along with the Argo and Whinstone facilities, BIT Mining, a Chinese mining company, has invested $25m to build a mine in Texas.
An influx of interest from cryptocurrency businesses does not come without risk, though. Bitmain, a China-based company, said in 2018 that it would invest $500m to build a huge mining facility in Rockdale, bringing jobs to a community that has seen huge job losses after a coal plant closure in 2008. But after the price of bitcoin dropped to just over $3,000 in the fall, the company pulled out of the project.
Brendle, of Dickens, said that his optimism is cautious. He has hope that cryptocurrency mining will be able to bolster his county’s economy and give stable jobs to some of his residents, but he notes that long-term sustainability is important.
“We see movement now, we see a lot of interest. We understand why that interest is there. But we just don’t know what the future of bitcoin mining is,” Brendle said. “I think that’s the biggest concern right now is how long, how well the industry will sustain itself.”